


Eat Your Young

by idrilhadhafang



Series: Sequel Trilogy Missing Scenes [32]
Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Gen, Horror, Missing Scene, Movie: Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, Past Child Abuse, Sheev Palpatine Being An Asshole, The Sith Suck, Troubled Abuser, snoke backstory
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-04
Updated: 2021-03-04
Packaged: 2021-03-17 20:01:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 605
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29846760
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/idrilhadhafang/pseuds/idrilhadhafang
Summary: Palpatine tells Kylo about Snoke.
Series: Sequel Trilogy Missing Scenes [32]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1931056
Kudos: 1
Collections: Allbingo, Bad Day Collection





	Eat Your Young

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: The First Ten Minutes
> 
> Disclaimer: I own nothing.

  
Kylo hadn’t thought he would be asking about the Snoke-tubes, but...here he was.   
  
“You literally made Snoke,” Kylo said softly. “Somehow I’m...disappointed as to where he came from.”  
  
“And I’m disappointed with how he died,” Palpatine said. “I suppose all of that is...fair.” Then, "You no doubt have many questions. After the girl, I would be a poor teacher if I did not give you the answers you sought here, now.”  
  
“You already are,” Kylo said. It was blunt, unwise to say even to a drastic shell of the man who was Emperor, but it was true.   
  
“Or maybe you were a poor student,” Palpatine said. “I thought that I could make you stronger than your grandfather. The man he wasn’t. But you could not overcome the one thing that held your grandfather back.”  
  
“Sentiment.” Snoke had talked about that, in some of his lessons involving Vader.   
  
As much as Kylo admired him, it was true.   
  
“Everything Snoke taught you, he learned from me,” Palpatine said. “Do you think a Sith, a true Sith, could be formed through coddling?”  
  
"I...” And it was there that Kylo could swear that he was starting to crack. To splinter. Would that never not happen? “I didn’t want coddling,” he said. “I wanted to know I belonged somewhere. I wanted to know that someone wanted me, even if Luke didn’t.”  
  
Palpatine sneered. “Spoken like your grandfather’s grandson. Like Maul, and Tyrannus, and Grievous before you. Like Ventress. But the Sith isn’t for belonging. It is for proving yourself, not healing your wounds."  
  
(It was only later, when Luke resurrected him, that Ben learned what Palpatine had done to his uncle)  
  
Palpatine continued. “So Snoke tried to teach you. As I taught him.”  
  
An image, entering Ben’s mind. _An infant Snoke, entering into the world, gasping for breath as he was pried from his tank. Palpatine, smiling like a parody of a proud father._  
  
“Oh yes,” Palpatine said. “I crafted him. My war began with controlling life and death, and it’s only fitting that Snoke was my creation.”  
  
 _Snoke, growing older. A sickly child. Starting to toddle and bite — as much as Kylo hated and feared Snoke, he could not help but be struck by how young Snoke was in Palpatine’s memory. How small._  
  
 _Dangling over a pit on Exegol, forced to stop himself with the Force just in time. Snoke, reaching out, stopping himself just in time._  
  
“That...was where he got that idea?” Kylo, for a moment, could not form words. “He...passed on what he learned?”  
  
“Don’t be so appalled, young Solo. The strongest must rule if we are to survive.”  
  
But there was no hesitation in it. No feelings of regret, no feelings of principle. Palpatine...he was enjoying it. He was enjoying it, putting Snoke through training that outsiders would have called torture and abuse.   
  
“It’s a source of enjoyment for you,” Kylo said. “Like pulling the wings off flies.”  
  
Palpatine smiled slyly. “And your point is? I can at least say Snoke...acquired some of my best traits. I beat them into him.”  
  
 _Palpatine never beat him. Never left physical marks. Words and Force Lightning and training from hell did the job well enough._  
  
“He...” Kylo was about to say, _He didn’t have to do that to me,_ but instead, he said, “He was just a youngling.”  
  
“And you care about that just now? Your moments where weakness chooses to appear are as fickle as ever.”  
  
Kylo couldn’t deny that. Or, for that matter, that Snoke had seemed so small in the memories, and how fragile he’d become from the abuse.


End file.
